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Favorite Projects

Today, I read a blog post that made me so happy. Studio G touched on a subject that I’ve been mulling over much of my career. I encourage everyone to read it! (Duh, or I wouldn’t be sitting here posting about it 30 seconds after reading it).

About 5 years into my career, I left a job working on a wide variety of projects (hospitals, schools, trail systems, public parks, commercial spaces, but very few private residences) for a job that was exclusively private residences and estate work. I thought at the time that I was “looking for the soul” in Landscape Architecture. I expected, as Ms. Greayer noted, that home owners would take personal interest in their home landscapes. I really, really did. I worked on some wonderful homes, met some very interesting people, but when I re-designed my portfolio every now and then, I was surprised to discover which projects really meant something to me.

Some of my favorite projects aren’t even in my portfolio – they’re not glossy, they aren’t in magazines or books. For the most part, the ones that stand out to me, personally, are the ones that make a difference, even if I am never witness to it.

I’m quite fond of the memories from working on a design for a facility that hosts many (sixty plus) meetings a week treating the disease of addiction (alcoholics anonymous, narcotics anonymous, etc). I couldn’t meet the users of the facility in that instance as all the program participants had the expectation of anonymity. I was guided solely by my intuition about what the participants would find meaningful and I was rewarded in intangible ways beyond the images in my portfolio.

I also love a modest residence I worked on for a friend – her family didn’t work in the garden. Her sister gardened, her parents did, too (so I guess I had a head start), but she and her husband did not. After the project, they had become so involved with the process and so excited by it that now they’ve taken over. Their kids pick out bulbs at Trader Joe’s market and plant them in random places, there are regular family picnics in the yard, and I can see the pride of ownership they now feel. They use their garden more now than ever, and I helped to make that happen. What’s not to love?

What surprises me even more (still!) is how often the more expensive projects I’ve worked on, that contribute beautiful professional photographs to my portfolio (and are therefore good for my career, right?), still aren’t my favorites. I left some interesting work (back at year 5 of this journey) looking for “the soul” in Landscape Architecture. I’d believed that by focusing on the kind of projects that magazine editors dream of, I would be steeped in the creation of new and exciting beauty. But did those owners really care?

I whole heartedly agree with Ms. Greayer that those projects where the client will ‘get their hands dirty’ come with different expectations on both sides of the desk. I love all the projects I work on, but my strongest affections still lie with the projects that their people love, too.

Having said that, I garden and get my hands dirty….but I don’t do garden maintenance for others. There’s no reference or design solution on earth that can substitute for the feeling of moving soil and touching foliage. Thanks for such a great post, Ms. Greayer!